The Foundation for Civil Society (FCS)

Since 2017, ESTL continues receiving fund from the Foundation for Civil Society (FCS) for implementing the projects that geared to end Harmful Traditional Practices and Gender Based Violence (GBV) in Singida Region. The main project titled “Kick FGM Out of Singida” that was implemented through raising awareness to community members, changing attitudes and promoting behavioural change on harmful traditional Practices such as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), early marriages, early pregnancies and forced marriages in Singida region.

The project achieved the following results;

32, 379 (16,111 Boys and 16,268 Girls) Pupils/Students reached via the programs, and now the students they are aware and have capability of reporting GBV/FGM cases. The programs conducted to raise awareness for students to be able to reject FGM, child and forced marriages, and other forms of violence against children, girls and women by reporting threats or incidents of FGM/GBV (including Formation/Strengthening of School Reproductive Health Clubs).   

540 (250 women and 290 men) teachers trained so as to continue educating the students about FGM/GBV.

38 clubs formed/strengthened (each club has more 25 pupils from different classes) at different schools and linked with other clubs such as JIAMINI UWEZO UNAO (JUU) clubs formed by EQUIP and Health clubs.

Establishment of ESTL Mobile Data Tracking System with support of FCS in 2017 that facilitates collection, manipulation and dissemination of Violence against children information, the overall goal being to strengthen systems for reporting and responding to acts of violence against women, girls and children. The system now has 297 Digital Platforms with more than 60 People in each platform.

The system has brought about major improvements in exchanging of information and reporting of acts of violence against women and children in Singida including two cases of FGM, one involving a girl child aged 18 months and another aged 2 years, were reported in the 2018. ESTL worked with the officers of the district police force to enforce legal action against the circumcisers. Two mothers, one got a 3-year jail sentence, another 4 years and the Ngariba/Traditional Mutilator got a 6 years-jail sentence due to FGM cases. 45 years sentence of young man – aged 31 years old to jail due to Early Pregnancy case whereby the in law impregnated the sibling of his wife who was standard six.

Establishment of ONE-STOP-CENTRE (OSC) in Ikungi District and formation of National Plan of Action to end Violence against women and Children (NPA-VAWC) Committees from Council to Village Levels. 39 NPA-VAWC Committees formed at ward level and 138 formed at village levels.  

ESTL engaged and trained 16 Journalists in Singida on how to write and report FGM/GBV issues from different media houses such as local radio and TV i.e., Standard Radio to amplify the project message.

Training to Youth (boys and girls) out of school on FGM practices and their effects Youth Platforms were formed in the project wards to mobilize young people to become champions against FGM .61 Action plans were developed to ensure that youth activism against FGM/GBV is sustained at the project areas.

With partnering with LGAs we formed 15 youth and women agroeconomic groups (contain 305 members) in 13 wards of Singida District Councils and Singida Municipality. The groups trained on income generating activities and we assisted them to develop business and marketing plans. The groups up to current accessed technical assistances and received loans from their councils.